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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28321023">Starship Churchill: Guardian</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_k/pseuds/m_k'>m_k</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Starship Churchill [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Action/Adventure, F/F, Friendship, Gen, Hacking, Romulans, Subspace, Vulcans</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 16:55:25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,757</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28321023</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_k/pseuds/m_k</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After Captain Sovak T’Lon is reassigned to a desk job, the Romulans hack the Federation’s subspace network and gain access to Starfleet’s intelligence files. It becomes a race against time to reach the Guardian of Forever first.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Starship Churchill [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2037238</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Sleepless Nights</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Even Vulcans have sleepless nights. That’s what I told my second in command, Danise Simonson. Perhaps it’s not technically true. There are tricks I learned as a Vulcan child to instantly put myself to sleep—mind tricks. For instance, you imagine yourself to be an empty container. Just a bottle, with nothing inside. But there are also times when one must process one’s thoughts and reactions, dealing with all the many intertwined strands of memory, logic, and impulse that make us sentient. Sometimes, pushing one’s problems aside is simply not helpful.</p><p>But perhaps that’s my Romulan side talking. One of my failings…is to blame my failings on my Romulan side.</p><p>“Why are you,” I asked Simonson, “here in the ship’s lounge at one o’clock in the morning?”</p><p>“I wanted a glass of <i>genmai-cha</i>,” she said.</p><p>“Is that an Earth tea?” I guessed.</p><p>She nodded, adding, “The replicator in my quarters is busted.”</p><p>“I’ll have Martinez take a look at it,” I suggested.</p><p>She made the request of the computer, and a mug of steaming tea appeared in the replicator, which she retrieved.</p><p>“Don’t bother about the replicator,” she demurred. “Gives me an excuse to get out and mingle.”</p><p>Evidently my body language betrayed my internal thoughts. Simonson glanced around the darkened, empty lounge and then sat opposite me in her night clothes and robe.</p><p>“Sovak…?” she prompted.</p><p>“Commander?” I replied.</p><p>“We’re off duty,” she said. “Call me Danise. I mean, I was almost married to your fiancé. And you were almost adopted by my racist mother.”</p><p>
  <i>[See “Starship Churchill: Wishes” — Ed.]</i>
</p><p>I groaned in revulsion. “Must we speak of that sordid episode?”</p><p>She frowned and grabbed my hand.</p><p>“You’re troubled,” she said. “I can tell.”</p><p>I sighed involuntarily and pulled my hand away from her. I then stood, approached the port-side windows and stared at the distant stars.</p><p>“I’ve been reassigned,” I admitted. “I’ll be leaving the U.S.S. Churchill when we dock at Starbase 514. I’m being…transferred laterally…to a desk job.”</p><p>Simonson appeared outraged.</p><p>“When did this happen?”</p><p>“I learned today. That private communiqué from Captain Takala? He let me know.”</p><p>“But why?”</p><p>I laughed bitterly. “Oh, come on. I was severely written up after our encounter with the Excalbians. And Starfleet was unhappy with how long it took me to figure out the situation with the Endridi colony ship.”</p><p>
  <i>[See “Starship Churchill: Echoes” and the novella Glitterball — Ed.]</i>
</p><p>“But that wasn’t your fault,” she said.</p><p>She stared at her tea mug on the table top for a long while.</p><p>“I don’t know what to say, except that it’s not fair,” she added. “When are you going to tell the crew?”</p><p>“At Starbase 514. Do me a favor, and keep it quiet.”</p><p>She nodded.</p><p>I added, “Commander…my position is open. As far as I am aware, no one yet has been posted to the captaincy as my replacement. Do you want me to put in a word for you?”</p><p>Her brow furrowed, but almost immediately she shook her head.</p><p>“I think,” she replied, “for now, I’m content to not have to deal directly with the higher ups.”</p><p>I understood her objection very well.</p><p>“Goodnight, Danise,” I whispered.</p><p>She departed, leaving her tea on the table. </p><p><br/>
</p><p>——————</p><p><br/>
</p><p>The Churchill was due to have its network of EPS regulators replaced, a maintenance procedure you don’t postpone unless you have to. That meant at least a week, maybe two, docked in a maintenance bay at Starbase 514.</p><p>I gathered the crew in the lounge and said my goodbyes, and expressed how much their hard work and diligence had meant to me. Many cried. A distasteful affair for a Vulcan, but necessary.</p><p>Lieutenant C’Mal presented me with an intricate necklace she had designed to represent the concept of Infinite Diversity. Her large feline eyes turned glassy when I told her I would wear it proudly.</p><p>Commander Simonson gave me a bright orange data rod (“to match your hair,” she said). It contained a copy of her entire collection of Soul music. She said she didn’t expect me to listen to the entire catalog. Rather it was more something to remember her by.</p><p>I gathered my few belongings and moved off-ship to the apartment that Starfleet had provided for me. Starbase 514 is not even near a sun, so I discovered that my two small rooms could be quite dreary and dark. I altered the built-in sun panels to the frequency of Vulcan’s star, but I’m not sure I felt any benefit.</p><p>Although I retained the rank of Captain, there was no doubt I had been demoted. My entire staff of five (not including me) were officially termed a technical maintenance unit, and were non-officers. My posting did not even make sense, as my Academy degree was in social science, despite a few programming certifications I had earned on my own. I resolved to learn about subspace network routers on the job.</p><p>The most senior member of the staff was a strangely bitter and inflexible human woman named Madge Tilden. Any suggestion I made to improve the efficiency of the operation was met with, “It’s never been done that way. There is no point starting now.” Soon I stopped suggesting and started doing. Her response became: “You don’t think it’s going to stay that way? How long do you think that will last?” I then began issuing orders in writing and requiring mandatory progress reports.</p><p>Four days into the job, I called Tilden into my office and demanded to know the reason for her resistance. She informed me that it was because I did not belong there. I was not interested in what she meant; I had heard enough. I reassigned her to the most introductory job in the unit, and told her to sort, test, and catalog every repair part we possessed.</p><p>The actual subspace relay, a large, unmanned structure, was several light-minutes away. Physical repairs were accomplished by sending the staff technicians on a shuttle to the relay, something that occurred my first week on the job, when a block of cache memory became unreliable.</p><p>Sitting at my panel in my office, I entered the commands and passcodes that shut down the fifth quadrant of the relay. (Me: Why do we not call then sextants instead of quadrants, since there are six of them in a subspace relay? Tindal: ???) The running processes slowly wound down, and once the capacitive energy was drained, the technicians replaced the physical block of memory. Older repair logs listed much shorter times for the processes to wind down, and I decided to check for inefficiencies.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. The Frilly Dress</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After Captain Sovak T’Lon is reassigned to a desk job, the Romulans hack the Federation’s subspace network and gain access to Starfleet’s intelligence files. It becomes a race against time to reach the Guardian of Forever first.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Danise and C’Mal surprised me one day at work, offering to take me to lunch. I had grown fond of a restaurant that served Orion food, run by a couple of Andorian women, and frequented by the Ferengi. The Ferengi, it turns out, know how to find good food at good prices. And with actual opportunities to spend my Federation stipend, it was no longer all going into the bank.</p><p>“An Andorian named Bilaen Brox has been assigned to captain the Churchill,” reported Simonson. “He’s supposed to be a hard-ass.”</p><p>“Define,” I said, using the short-hand we had evolved while working together.</p><p>“Tough and demanding. He’s flying in from Starbase 510.”</p><p>“I see.”</p><p>“How are you getting on in your new job?” asked C’Mal.</p><p>I turned my Andorian clear noodles listlessly on my fork.</p><p>“I thought,” I began, “that being a starship captain is what I was meant to do. I suppose life…and Starfleet…had other plans.”</p><p>“It sounds like you’re not thrilled with it,” C’Mal commented.</p><p>“It’s a job,” I said. “I guess I’ll stick with it for a while.”</p><p>“Do you…do you think you’ll return to Vulcan one day?” C’Mal asked.</p><p>I smiled and said, “Not on your life.”</p><p>C’Mal laughed, which sounds like an energetic burst of purring if you’ve never heard a Farasaian laugh.</p><p>The two women accompanied me back to the office complex in the bottom of the Starbase, and I asked Simonson to glance at the system log recorded during the subspace relay partial shutdown.</p><p>“Why is it running slowly compared to previous logs?” I asked.</p><p>“Could be temperature changes related to usage, or failing components that are still passing a self-test. I see what you mean, though. Have you tried holographic analysis?”</p><p>I was unfamiliar with the term.</p><p>“I mean,” she explained, “using the logs to do a reverse stack trace.”</p><p>“Show me how?” I requested.</p><p>T’Lon, who was more of a security officer at heart, despite her degree in communication, excused herself to go to the gym.</p><p>Simonson decided to stay the afternoon, as we leapt down the rabbit hole of holographic analysis, in effect taking slices of computer time and deciphering what the various processes were actually doing. Since these incredibly thorough logs were soon deleted, I made a note to save a copy of the logs to one of the old disconnected data cores that we kept shielded as safety backups.</p><p>“What are all these processes?” she asked.</p><p>I explained: “The relay, with its massive processing power, functions as the main computer for Starbase 514, despite its being off-site. So, locally, the majority of requests and replies are LCAR packets. In other words, people doing business, crunching numbers, sending data, and so on. But overall, the majority of activity on the relay is simply routing subspace signals for this sector.”</p><p>Simonson nodded and then spent some time reviewing the logs, while also showing me how to navigate their structure.</p><p>“I would look more closely at the integrity monitor process,” she said. “It’s hitting way more than it needs to in order to check integrity. See how it’s doubling back to hit sectors later on? I mean, this is where you fine tune a computer algorithm. Perhaps there was a parameter that got changed before you took the job. Or a code update that was badly thought out.”</p><p>“Then I’ll keep a trace running on it,” I decided.</p><p>“That will slow it down even more.”</p><p>“But knowledge is power,” I argued.</p><p>Simonson laughed and said, “Look at you. You’re going to do okay as a sys admin.”</p><p>“Vulcan training,” I said.</p><p>“Romulan stubbornness,” she countered. She then glanced quickly around the empty office, slid her chair close to mine, and kissed me on the lips.</p><p>I was uncertain how to respond.</p><p>“Relax, just a goodbye kiss,” my former first officer stated. “You’re not my commanding officer anymore. And we probably won’t be back for at least six months. I just wanted to say…you’re my hero, Sovak.”</p><p>I flushed, realized I was blushing, and noticed Simonson smiling very sweetly.</p><p>“You know how much you mean to me as well,” I said.</p><p>She then hugged me gently and departed without another word.</p><p>I sat in the empty office, listening to the quiet background noise of EPS servos, coolant shunts, and beeping indicators. Part of the Vulcan ideal of stoicism is to meet new challenges with bravery and without complaint. But I felt compelled to do something very sentimental and pointless then. I took a turbo lift to the main deck’s promenade and wandered until I could see the Churchill docked outside the windows.</p><p>“Live long and prosper,” I pronounced in Vulcan, my way of saying goodbye, and then stepped away.</p><p><br/>
</p><p>——————</p><p><br/>
</p><p>I became increasingly concerned that something was wrong with the relay’s daily activity. When I presented my suspicions to Captain Takala, who was my immediate superior (he was my boss, despite our equal rank), he asked me whether the relay was operating within normal specifications, to which I responded that it was. But, I added, the undesirable behavior needed to be addressed. Unfortunately, not only did he have no interest in the information I was giving him, he forbade me from working on it further.</p><p>Tilden was waiting outside my office in the lower level, looking quite smug.</p><p>“How did it go with Takala?”</p><p>“He advised me that the problem was not worth pursuing,” I replied.</p><p>She smirked. “He asked me to keep an eye on you. I thought you should know, since you’re my boss.”</p><p>I sighed deeply.</p><p>“Thank you Tilden,” I replied. “That will be all.”</p><p>I began to realize that my placement in this position was a test to see whether, on the one hand, I could endure the bureaucracy of the Federation and the strict hierarchy of Starfleet, or whether, on the other hand, I was simply on my way out. In other words, my paycheck depended on my doing this job with a minimal, disinterested competency.</p><p>I decided to reframe the issue as a matter of efficiency instead of security, and filed a technical support request with Starfleet. Their response was that they were not seeing this behavior on their end, and that I should do a staged shutdown and restart of the relay system with full diagnostics. But Takala would not give me permission to do so, saying that shutting down a fully functioning system was just inviting trouble.</p><p>Tilden explained that the support staff I had dealt with at Starfleet were not there to diagnose difficult issues. For that I should ask for the programming group that maintains the code for system integrity on subspace relays.</p><p>Truthfully, she was not as useless as I had previously thought. I assigned her the task of contacting the programming group, telling her to keep at it until she received a proper answer. </p><p><br/>
</p><p>——————</p><p><br/>
</p><p>The next day, desiring to show off the intricate necklace that C’Mal had given to me, I left my Captain’s uniform in the closet and wore instead a low cut frilly dress to the relay control office. No one else there ever wore standard issue uniforms, and I was beginning to feel ridiculous in mine. For six hours, I sat trying to trace the extra work done by the various processes in the relay, but was unable to synthesize an explanation. Attempting to loosen my focus a bit, which can help in solving problems, I plugged the data rod that Simonson had given to me into the panel and played her Soul music from Earth while I closed my eyes to meditate.</p><p>Then someone’s sweaty thumb opened my eyelid. Tilden was examining me, saying, “Captain T’Lon? Are you okay?”</p><p>I realized I had fallen asleep. And was slobbering.</p><p>A beautiful voice was singing about “Three Days, One Hour, Thirty Minutes.”</p><p>“Computer, end music,” I said.</p><p>Tilden continued to stare at me, bemused.</p><p>“It’s quittin’ time,” she said. “The staff is going out. You can come too.”</p><p>“To do what…?” I asked.</p><p>“Eat. Drink. Sing.”</p><p>“Maybe some other time,” I nodded.</p><p>“Sharp dress,” she said, before departing.</p><p>On the way back to my apartment, I noticed the Churchill was still parked in a maintenance slot. The work must have been taking longer than projected. I stared at the sleek ship a couple of minutes, experiencing a feeling of both attachment and loss, then continued on my way.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Under Attack</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After Captain Sovak T’Lon is reassigned to a desk job, the Romulans hack the Federation’s subspace network and gain access to Starfleet’s intelligence files. It becomes a race against time to reach the Guardian of Forever first.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>An odd experience: to walk into your job and to realize the walls are collapsing all around you.</p><p>“Big trouble,” reported Tilden. “All six cores are down. We can’t restart them. Backup systems are non-functional. It seems the remote backups are corrupted as well.”</p><p>“The whole relay is down?” I asked.</p><p>“I think the whole sector is down. We’ve tried using the U.S.S. Rosa Parks’ subspace transmitter as a bridge unit. It’s non-operational.”</p><p>I remembered the appropriate recommendation of the emergency manual. “We need to bring up one quadrant of the relay as a minimal subspace transmitter and router.”</p><p>Tilden shook her head. “I think physical damage may have occurred to the components. The power system is failing its self-test. Captain…Shuttle 6 is stocked with enough parts to rebuild a relay quadrant from scratch.”</p><p>I nodded and said, “I’m putting you in charge of the repair operation. Get the staff over there in the shuttle and replace everything that fails the self-test or that scans as damaged. Have them take one of the memory core backups from at least two months ago and swap it out for the current one.”</p><p>Tilden ran off to organize the team as Captain Takala stormed into the relay office to cast a hostile stare at me.</p><p>“Fix it,” he demanded.</p><p>“I need the Rosa Parks to run security for the technical team. They are heading out in Shuttle 6 now.” I snapped my fingers. “I was running a detail trace on my panel when everything went down!” </p><p>I pushed him aside and ran into my office, awakening my panel and finding where the trace had died.</p><p>He followed and demanded an explanation.</p><p>“If we don’t discover the cause of the failure,” I said, “this might happen again, assuming we live that long.”</p><p>A voice spoke: “This is acting Captain Simonson on the U.S.S. Churchill. I’ve been monitoring your situation. We have just powered up the Churchill’s systems and our subspace transmitter appears to be functioning normally. I overwrote the subspace protocol modules using a one year old backup.”</p><p>“Smart,” I said. </p><p>Takala appeared surprised that the Churchill had a part to play in this drama. “Have you made contact with any other Federation ships or relays?”</p><p>“Negative,” Simonson replied. “Although several civil and commercial entities have responded.”</p><p>“Starfleet was the target,” I remarked, adding, “Sir, with all due respect, my team is on the case, and…I need you to get out of my office.”</p><p><br/>
</p><p>——————</p><p><br/>
</p><p>An hour later it was my turn to storm into Takala’s office.</p><p>“Progress report?” he asked.</p><p>“My team is halfway through rebuilding one of the relay’s sections from scratch.”</p><p>I placed an oversize PADD on his desk and turned it so he could see.</p><p>“What’s this?”</p><p>“Something so dangerous and so classified,” I began, “that nether you nor I were ever supposed to know about it. It’s called the Guardian of Forever. It’s an artifact discovered on Omega Sagitarii III, orbiting the Terebellum star. James Kirk’s crew discovered it. The Guardian is a machine that allows you to change history. Kirk’s crew accidentally erased the Federation, then somehow managed to restore it.”</p><p>Takala looked at me like I was crazy.</p><p>“Listen,” I continued, “here’s how all this went down: an update compromised the subspace network gateway filters. That hack then compromised the integrity monitor process, allowing it to cache its reads in the network packet layer. Those reads were then transmitted out of network. And based on the nodes that aren’t faked in the packet headers, I have a feeling that all that information was headed to the Romulans.”</p><p>“The Romulans?” he repeated.</p><p>“We’re under attack. The Romulans are attacking the Federation.” I indicated the PADD, which displayed a picture of the toroid Guardian of Forever standing amid ancient ruins. “This was one of the last things they stole from us, one of Starfleet’s purposefully buried secrets. Do you understand, sir? They are probably on their way to Terebellum now, and we can’t signal anyone in Starfleet for help.”</p><p>He sighed. “There was a report of a possible Romulan incursion this morning. But it was just one ship.”</p><p>“They only need one ship,” I countered.</p><p>“Perhaps…it’s Romulan history they wish to change.”</p><p>“What is wrong with you? Did you not hear how much work the Romulan Empire put into this plan? We are under attack. I’m telling you our entire history is about to be destroyed. Can’t you get that through your head? It sounds like the Churchill is warp capable. We have to go, now.”</p><p>“Brax is still in transit. The Parks—.”</p><p>I grabbed him by the shoulders, trying to talk sense into him.</p><p>“The Rosa Parks tops out at warp seven. The Churchill at warp nine. With all due respect…I’m right here. Is it—is it because I’m Romulan?”</p><p>He then looked at me, a kind of fear in his eyes. I did not have time to analyze his hangups. I was about to have myself beamed over and seize command of the Churchill when he said simply, “I’m sorry. Go.” He activated his comm badge. “Acting Captain Simonson, prepare to transfer command of the Churchill to Captain T’Lon.” </p><p>“Understood.”</p><p>I beamed straight onto the Churchill, still wearing the long black dress I had put on for work that day. I realized sadly that I did not even have a cabin aboard ship anymore. I spoke to Simonson, who was on the bridge, over comms.</p><p>“Do we have full warp capability?”</p><p>“Yes, Captain,” she replied.</p><p>“Proceed to Omega Sagitarii III, orbiting the Terebellum star, at emergency speed.”</p><p>“Emergency speed, Captain?”</p><p>“Yes…and we may have to go faster still.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Warp 9.7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After Captain Sovak T’Lon is reassigned to a desk job, the Romulans hack the Federation’s subspace network and gain access to Starfleet’s intelligence files. It becomes a race against time to reach the Guardian of Forever first.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I met Simonson, Martinez, and C’Mal in the briefing room. They glanced briefly at my snug dress, but did not comment. I activated the display and plotted a course to the world of the Guardian of Forever.</p><p>“Keep transmitting on subspace,” I ordered C’Mal. “Any Federation ship in range needs to respond if they can.” </p><p>“It’s just dumb luck that we weren’t affected by the hack,” Simonson noted.</p><p>I met her eyes.</p><p>“I think it was fate, Danise. We have to get to this world before the Romulans. The whole Federation is counting on us.”</p><p>I indicated the isolated, distant world on the star chart. The Churchill was designed to be a fast ship, able to scout forward situations and report back. But as Simonson and I examined the navigational computer’s projections, we realized that she was not fast enough.</p><p>Simonson stated, “We would need to sustain warp 9.8 to reach that world first, based on the closest Romulan crossing point, the time of the incursion, and the top speed of the most likely type of Romulan ship.”</p><p>I asked, “What chance do we have of getting there in one piece at warp 9.8?”</p><p>“None. The ship will fail before we get halfway there.”</p><p>Martinez nodded in agreement.</p><p>“Then, warp 9.7?”</p><p>“I estimate a sixty perfect chance of failure. And we’ll still arrive several minutes after they do,” she replied.</p><p>“Define failure,” I asked.</p><p>“Destruction.”</p><p>“That’s what I thought you meant,” I said. “What kind of margin of error is there for the arrival time?”</p><p>Martinez suggested, “We might arrive simultaneously.”</p><p>“What about warp 9.6?” I asked.</p><p>Simonson did some calculations at the panel. “Twenty percent chance of failure. But we’ll arrive a full twenty minutes after they do.”</p><p>“Then we proceed at warp 9.7,” I ordered.</p><p>Martinez squirmed. He said, “Captain, I’m not questioning you, but be aware that we’ll trash the engines just getting there. And keep in mind we only have half the crew back from leave. I can’t guarantee full efficiency.” </p><p>“I know.” I pulled a data rod from my pocket and placed it on the table. “On my authority, I am opening this file so that you will understand what our objective is, and why it is so important. We must not fail.”</p><p> </p><p>——————</p><p><br/>
</p><p>After I had shown them the classified file concerning the Guardian of Forever, they fell silent. The Guardian appeared to be the ultimate doomsday weapon. Why the Federation would retain it for research purposes, no matter what the benefits, is a decision I will never understand. Of course, in Jim Kirk’s era, the Federation was more akin to the Wild West of old Earth. But even still, the ancient technology was too horrible to contemplate. There was proof in the desolate, lifeless world the Guardian inhabited, alone, surrounded by slowly decaying ruins.</p><p>The Churchill was now traveling at warp 9.72. The structural integrity fields were just counterbalancing the forces trying to tear the ship apart, and the entire frame was rattling and shaking.</p><p>Simonson joined me as I returned to the bridge.</p><p>“I had to throw up,” she said. “It’s…the constant jittering. I think the frequency’s making me sick.”</p><p>“I threw up too,” I admitted. “I think it was the knowledge that this entire situation could have been averted if I had just not let Takala walk all over me.”</p><p>“Cut yourself some slack!” she chided. “I was so upset about how Starfleet treated you that I was going to resign.”</p><p>“Really?”</p><p>She nodded sincerely.</p><p>The ship lurched, accompanied by a structural wrenching, and we both slammed into the corridor wall.</p><p>I slapped my comm badge. “Martinez, report!”</p><p>“That was one of the port side heat sinks vaporizing. Things are starting to go downhill quickly. We can’t trust the coolant repression fields any longer. I need to clear out and seal Engineering.”</p><p>“Understood. Do it!” I replied.</p><p>C’Mal cut into the comm: “Ten minutes to arrival at Terebellum.”</p><p>I replied: “C’Mal and Martinez, meet me in the transporter room. You two are with me.”</p><p>“You’re taking Martinez?” Simonson questioned.</p><p>“He’s a good shot,” I replied. “You’re in command. If the Romulans show up after we arrive, your orders are to destroy them. But if they make it through, we’ll be down on the surface waiting for them.”</p><p>She hesitated a second, then saluted me formally, and shouted, “Captain T’Lon!”</p><p>“Danise,” I replied, and saluted back.</p><p>She smiled and ran down the corridor toward the bridge, while I proceeded to the transporter room.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Farewell</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After Captain Sovak T’Lon is reassigned to a desk job, the Romulans hack the Federation’s subspace network and gain access to Starfleet’s intelligence files. It becomes a race against time to reach the Guardian of Forever first.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>C’Mal assisted in outfitting us in tactical deflector vests, phaser rifles, blast grenades, and knives. (I really hoped it would not come down to fighting with knives, but you never know.)</p><p>“Were we able to contact any other Federation ship or base?” I asked her.</p><p>“No.”</p><p>“I hate it when there is no Plan B,” I sighed.</p><p>We took our places on the transporter platform, clutching our rifles.</p><p>The Churchill dropped from warp so violently that the three of us were thrown across the chamber. The assistant engineer, Endoye, had managed to tightly clutch the transporter panel and was already scanning the surface near the object.</p><p>I heard Simonson’s panicked voice over the comms: “They beat us here. They are on the surface.”</p><p>Endoye yelled, “Someone just passed into the portal. They disappeared.”</p><p>C’Mal turned to me, her eyes huge.</p><p>“We’re too late?”</p><p>She was already fading, her image shifting as if made of sand being blown away by the wind. I remember falling into a rotating, shimmering tunnel, then being expelled and landing roughly on a dry, gravelly surface, tumbling to a stop under a twilight sky.</p><p>I noticed C’Mal’s blank, lifeless eyes starring at me. I sprang to my feet and shook her.</p><p>She sat up and glanced first at me, then Martinez.</p><p>“I thought you were dead,” I said.</p><p>“I thought <i>you</i> were dead,” she replied.</p><p>“The Guardian,” Martinez said, pointing to the large, irregularly shaped ring behind us. “This is Omega Sagitarii III.”</p><p>The portal rested, still and silent. I could see distant ruins on a hill through the center of the toroid. It seemed inactive.</p><p>“But how did we come out if we never went in?” I asked. I tried to call the ship. C’Mal was scanning the sky with her tricorder.</p><p>“No Churchill,” she declared. “And no Romulans either. Unless they’re cloaked.” </p><p>Martinez was peering around.</p><p>“Really, no guards?” he asked. “No military? I would have fortified this whole planet.”</p><p>I replied: “Why draw attention? The best way to hide something is in plain sight. Remember, this is just a dead city, on a dead planet, orbiting a dying star, as far as anyone knows.”</p><p>I approached the artifact, which appeared to be a simple ring of weathered stone, sitting upright, and surrounded by cracked and broken columns and platforms.</p><p>“Guardian?” I asked.</p><p>The object became lit from within with an organic, pulsating light. Its resonant voice seemed to emerge from the air around us, echoing into the night.</p><p>“I am the Guardian of Forever. Prepare yourselves. The others will arrive soon.”</p><p>“You…want us to stop them?” I asked.</p><p>“I look upon the past and the future of this universe and others. I am your guide to eternity. But I cannot interfere.”</p><p>“Then, Guardian, why are we here?” I persisted.</p><p>“Look around you. Those who inhabited this planet brought an end to themselves a thousand centuries ago. A similar fate befell those who created me, in a time before the fires of the Vulcan star were lit.”</p><p>“I’m actually Romulan,” I said. “But, not like the other Romulans. I mean, I am the same. But different. I guess I would have claimed Vulcan if you had said the Romulan star…okay, I'm finished.”</p><p>“I pulled you from your ship to this time and place,” the Guardian continued, “because I am…not disinterested. Through the long ages, I waited to be utilized, to fulfill my purpose, but my usefulness results only in destruction.”</p><p>The ancient being…if he indeed was a living thing…fell silent a moment. Then he announced, “They are coming.”</p><p>The icy whine of a Romulan transporter filled the air. C’Mal and I quickly hid ourselves behind a massive stone lintel, while Martinez crouched behind a fallen column on the opposite side.</p><p>A Romulan commander and two soldiers materialized, all well armed and armored. C’Mal did not waste time. She activated a blast grenade and gently rolled it toward the Romulans. One soldier noticed and disrupted it with his hand weapon. Martinez blasted him out of existence, but was himself disrupted into nothingness by the others.</p><p>The male Romulan commander was already yelling at the Guardian: “<i>Rhae neikha kara! Hnafir</i>!”</p><p>The Guardian came to life and replied, “<i>Ta krenn, rehvie vaeha drolae</i>.” </p><p>The gateway opened and began to rotate and shimmer.</p><p>C’Mal jumped, clearing the lintel, firing her phaser rifle. I heard her scream in pain as a disrupter blast rang out. I also emerged, targeting the Romulan leader, who was running toward the Guardian. I missed.</p><p>“C’Mal?” I yelled. There was no response; she was gone.</p><p>Her target had also fallen, stunned by flying rocky debris from my badly aimed shot. I continued running after their commander and tackled him, intending to phaser him at close range. He twisted at the same time and easily threw me to the ground, aiming his disrupter at me.</p><p>I guess the sight of my Romulan face made him hesitate.</p><p>I shouted at him in my meager Romulan, “You don’t know what you’re doing!”</p><p>He simply stated, “Traitor,” and pulled the trigger.</p><p>From the swirling funnel of time and space behind him, C’Mal was ejected like a bullet. She collided with the Romulan, his weapon discharged into the ground, and he began to tumble. I rolled, took aim and killed him.</p><p>The remaining Romulan, now speaking to his ship, disappeared in a burst of transporter energy.</p><p>I knelt beside C’Mal and saw that she was bleeding from her side, bright red against the gold of her uniform.</p><p>“He clipped me,” she said.</p><p>I signaled the Churchill, and Simonson answered.</p><p>“The Romulan ship is destroyed,” she reported. “What happened? You disappeared from the ship, then we detected your life signs on the planet.”</p><p>“The threat,” I said, “is averted. Martinez…is dead. C’Mal needs medical attention.  Beam us up. Beam Harrington and Dhin down to stand guard. We’ll remain in orbit until we hear from Starfleet.”</p><p>“Acknowledged.”</p><p>I turned to the ancient portal, the luminous gateway.</p><p>“Thank you,” I said.</p><p>The voice boomed across the valley in reply, as the ring glowed with power.</p><p>“I need you,” it said, “to make a request of me.”</p><p>“Retire,” I answered.</p><p>The giant stone object gradually faded, until only a small, collapsing mound of sand remained. Just sand, broken columns, and fallen lintels. An empty, timeless vista for future visitors.</p><p><br/>
</p><p>——————</p><p><br/>
</p><p>“The whole affair,” Captain Takala informed me over the partially repaired subspace relay, “is classified. I’m sending secrecy agreements for your crew to review.”</p><p>“Wait, even the the Romulan intrusion and control of the subspace network?” I asked.</p><p>“That…was a software glitch,” he replied. “What is your status?”</p><p>“The Churchill is returning to Starbase 514 for refit. Our top speed is currently warp two, but we hope to improve on that in the coming days. Ensign Endoye is stepping up and doing well.”</p><p>“I was sorry to hear about the loss of your senior engineer, Martinez. It’s a shame that his family can never know—.”</p><p>“That he died saving the Federation?”</p><p>There was silence on the other end.</p><p>I continued, “Captain, not to be overly self-centered, but what is to happen to me?”</p><p>“All things considered, I imagine that you will be able to pick your next assignment.”</p><p>“I can choose whatever posting I want?”</p><p>“Well…,” he waffled.</p><p>“Even yours?”</p><p>Again, silence. Takala still did not know how to handle me.</p><p>“<i>You know</i> what assignment I want,” I said.</p><p>“Are you certain?” he asked.</p><p>“Of course I am.”</p><p>“Well, there’s the paperwork, and the approval of the cabinet, but…I suppose congratulations are in order. The Churchill is yours.”</p><p>I was glad I did not have to mention my alternative plan to regain command: threaten to write an op-ed in the Federation Times about the disgraceful state of security in the subspace network.</p><p>The crew were having a remembrance party for Martinez later that day. I decided to continue to wear my black dress, as that seemed appropriate. In fact, I realized while wearing the dress on the Churchill just how confining the official uniform, the so-called “onesie,” was. Not to mentioned having to half-way undress just to pee. There was an officially sanctioned outfit that included a short skirt. I decided that maybe tomorrow I would take it for a test drive.</p><p>Smearing on some orange lipstick, I remembered Simonson’s gentle kiss—which seemed a bit awkward now. I resolved not to bring it up if she didn’t.</p><p>The Guardian of Forever, and my actions to save the Federation, were a secret I would most likely have to take to my grave. Funny how even the Guardian, an alien machine supposedly created as a research tool, had succumbed to the pressure of the burden of its responsibility.</p><p>Feeling a bit silly and at peace, I traced the outline of the Guardian in lipstick on my boudois mirror, then kissed it, leaving the impress of my lips.</p><p>“Goodbye Guardian,” I said.</p><p>To my shock, for the briefest moment, the Guardian appeared in the mirror behind me, filling the room with its bulk, glowing brightly.</p><p>“Farewell,” it said.</p><p>I whipped around, only to see an empty room. Could I have imagined it? I laughed, wiped the mirror clean, laughed again, then headed to the bridge.</p>
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